I love the term "coattail nomination" and will use it regularly from now on. There are even coattail winners, like Charlton Heston and Hugh Griffith in Ben-Hur . It's easier to nominate a Penelope Milford in a top film than a superior performance in a less-seen film. Uh-oh: not a fan of An...

1933 : A good year for comedy, drama, and musicals. A really good year if you are a fan of some or all of these actresses (alphabetical order): Greta Garbo, Jean Harlow, Katharine Hepburn, Miriam Hopkins, Barbara Stanwyck, and Loretta Young. Favorites : Duck Soup The Bitter Tea of General Yen Littl...

Yes, I had a great-aunt named Gertrude, an aunt named Ethel. My parents were introduced by a woman named Edna. When I was looking up Max Showalter, his parents were Ira and Elma Showalter. We have to remember that Gertrude and Ethel were the Taylor and Madison of their day. Or that Taylor and Madiso...

What I think of as "old lady names"--names that no woman under 60 had when I was growing up--are back in fashion. Hannah, Emma, Sophie, Eliza, Amelia--a friend has high school students with these names. I know people who have named their little girls Mabel and Millie. Rosalie is much worth...

I Love Melvin wrote: ↑May 13th, 2024, 6:01 pm My favorite movie mother:

"Avez-vous bourbon?"

CBS has two new hits with Tracker and Elsbeth . I was happy that Melissa Roxburgh, the star of Manifest , is playing Justin Hartley's younger sister, though she won't be a regular on the show. I was even happier that Elsbeth is not PC in its choice of villains. Any celebrity can be a villain. As wit...

There aren't any characters in Agatha Christie's books who are openly referred to as gay or lesbian, although A MURDER IS ANNOUNCED has a couple easily identifiable as lesbian. One of them figures out something about the first murder and is herself killed. In one of the later novels, Raymond West, M...

Agree about Sean (although I haven't seen THE RUSSIA HOUSE or ROBIN AND MARIAN). Agree about Sean getting better with age. Wasn't excited about Robin and Marian , but love Russia House - partly because of the score. Not sure what Sean was thinking with Zardoz (1974).... https://th.bing.com/th/id/OI...

We just watched "The Case of the Wandering Widow" on Perry Mason, featuring Casey Adams/Max Showalter. It is so not a spoiler that his character turns out to be slimy and gets bumped off. Agatha Christie fans will note a resemblance in set-up to ORDEAL BY INNOCENCE, although this episode t...

I guess I'm a little out of step, but my favorite Robert Ryan movie is About Mrs. Leslie (1954) with Shirley Booth, in which he played a married but lonely industrialist who befriended in a mostly platonic way a kindred spirit (Booth) and vacationed with her once a year, the only time he felt he co...

Had Follow Me Quietly been shown before? Some of it seemed awfully familiar. Nicely directed. Dorothy Patrick is like a cross between Dorothy Malone and Rosemary Clooney. Jeff Corey did some scene stealing.

Interesting intro by Eddie about the condition of RKO just before this picture was made.

Speaking of Dracula: the first ten minutes of Kevin Spacey's performance as Hickey in The Iceman Cometh are available on YouTube. This is simply some of the best acting I have ever seen.

A comparison of the 1960 (Sidney Lumet, TV) and 1973 (John Frankenheimer, AFT series of filmed plays for movies) versions of The Iceman Cometh. Both are highly recommended. The 1960, on YouTube, has starts and stops, but this isn't too distracting. I rather prefer the black & white to the 1973 d...

If you are a Thelma Ritter fan, The Model and the Marriage Broker is a must. I think it was shown on TCM once before. Thelma has the leading role, although Jeanne Crain has top billing.

And again tonight.